I promise I’m alive. But I’m also at home and quite honestly, blogging wasn’t my first priority. Sleep was.

It’s been a bit of an odd Christmas. My family takes a trip to Mexico most years and we are due to leave in two days. I’m stoked and very excited, but at the same time, my family is in crisis mode because of a very shitty thing we call cancer. I don’t want to talk about it.

Anyway, it’s made me rethink the whole Christmas thing. And I arrived at the realization that even my very down-to-earth family was “consumed” by the consumption aspect of the season. (See what I did there?) This Christmas, we got together with my dad’s side of the family. It was sort of this big family reunion, with people I hadn’t seen in over a decade sharing a laugh, a cry, a regret. It was really special even though the event itself, to say goodbye to a beloved uncle, was really upsetting. Realizing how much love one family can hold really made an impact on me. Especially during the holiday season, as fake as this sounds.

A lot has been weighing on my mind lately and I think maybe I just needed a place to write it all down. Organizing my thoughts seems to help. That’s lesson number one, kids: write it all out. Then have a good cry and maybe write more.

Sometimes that’s all you can do.

Happy Holidays.